Skiing in Control - Free thoughts and suggestions from one of Europe's top coaches.

Tag Archives: mind control

Ski coaching for anxious skiers has much to do with enhancing Confidence!

Ski in Control. It is your right !

How would it be, for you, if you had more of it just when you needed it?

Your level of self confidence is not dictated by outside circumstances. You are not an “empty vessel” subject only to external influences. What is more is that if you don’t have as much self confidence as you would like to have, you have it within your power to have more. If you are prepared to work at it.

Top sportsmen and women use several powerful and simple techniques, to help them maintain a high level of self confidence in the face of challenges, and set backs.

If, on occasion, your performance is less than you would have wished, (who’s isn’t?) then at least one of the possible contributory factors to that was a lack of a high level of self confidence. Continue reading →

Self confidence in skiing is the hardest part of skiing. It’s much more difficult than all those issues of technique. I’ll make this the first part of a multi-part post – which is my way of saying I’m not sure what it will stretch to!

Positive feedback loops.

First of all it’s to do with controlling positive feedback loops. Here’s one describing cattle stampedes. Once a critical number of cattle start running – no specific threat is required – it sets up a panic in some others. That sets them running and the increased number raises the panic level, and it just keeps self-reinforcing. It also applies to human ones – why everyone runs for the same exit door – no one stops to observe and think.

Each of these reinforces the other, over and over again

Above all, the good news is that regarding your own skiing you can work on this topic l-o-n-g before you head for the slopes. In fact it works best when you are safe at home.

In my book I differentiate between ‘external’ and ‘internally generated’ stressors. Continue reading →

Sports psychology plays a big part in top level sports nowadays. As anyone will know who has been on my skiing courses, visited the bobski.com blog, or read my book here

It is not an arcane science that is only available to elite performers, we can all use it.

The picture above is of Irish Rugby star Johnny Sexton making the drop-kick during overtime minutes in the Ireland-vs-France match yesterday. The significance for out skiing, you ask ?

The pressure on him was enormous; the time available almost non-existent; his responsibility to the rest of his team who had worked incredibly hard to set-up this half-opportunity equally burdensome.

Using imagery, from sports psychology, to improve your chances.

Interviewed afterwards, Sexton said seconds before he took the kick – a 42 yarder ! – he remembered and evisioned a previous game, years before, with almost the same characterisitics, when he took a similar kick that had succeeded !

He implied that his imagery had helped him succeed with this one. I believe him.

Whatever level of skiing ability you currently possess, you can use imagery and mental control techniques to help you. Like everything to do with skill, whether skiing or not, you need practice at mental techniques. But they are just as available to you as they are to elite performers.

Learn about skiing mental techniques and you will improve your skiing more than you may think.

Imagery works. I cover a lot of it in other blog posts, some of my “white papers” – if you want some just write to me at bobski@bobski.com and of course I explain much more fully the things that you can do, in my book: the link above should take you to it or just Google Ski In Control: How to ski ANY piste, anywhere, in full control.

Ski learning may not at first seem closely related to Roman philosophy. The same is not true in reverse because philosophy is a part of everything in life. Seneca had some very powerful and useful things to say about ski learning. Take them to heart and you will be happier. Continue reading →

It is extremely difficult to do anything requiring skill if either you don’t believe that you are capable of it, or if your mental state at the time is not conducive. This particularly applies to skiing. First you have to believe it’s possible for you.

This is of particular interest to us skiers, because we are frequently challenged by the circumstances we have gone out looking for, in such a way that our mental equilibrium is disturbed by apprehension or even fear.

To be a controlled skier, or skiing in control in times of perceived extreme challenge, what we need first is control of our minds. We need the best mental state. Click here for pdf Continue reading →

This morning my long suffering wife made some smarty-pants comment about my memory being somewhat suspect. Dammit she’s right.

The ensuing conversation (not a heated debate) raised an interesting issue related to skiing, and how to ski in control. Why is it, we wondered, that memorising things has never been that easy even when we were young? And yet once we know how to do something, there is no need to memorise it. Once you know something, memory is not required. This can lead to difficulties – if you have practiced “doing turns” sufficiently often for example you will have trapped yourself into a very limited kind of skiing from which escape and further development will be jolly difficult, because “doing turns” is not an appropriate concept. Continue reading →

How would it be, for you, if you had more of it just when you needed it?

Your level of self confidence is not dictated by outside circumstances. You are not an “empty vessel” subject only to external influences. If you don’t have as much self confidence as you would like to have, you have it within your power to have more.

There are several powerful and simple techniques which top sportsmen and women use, as a matter of course, to help them maintain a high level of self confidence in the face of challenges, and set backs.

If, on occasion, your performance is less than you would have wished, (who’s isn’t?) then at least one of the possible contributory factors to that may have been a lack of a high level of self confidence. Is it really possible to help yourself to have more? Continue reading →

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